He chuckled and rolled over to grab me and pull me into him, nuzzling into my neck. “Hopefully, you.”
“That’s a guarantee. Wanna spend the day together?”
“Mmhmm.” He kissed my neck, slipping his thigh between my legs. “I wanna take you on a date.”
“Ooh, fancy.” I wrapped my arms around his neck and hitched my leg onto his hip.
“Fancy date for my shiny Penny.”
I smiled and pulled him even closer. “Can we go by my place and pick up some stuff?”
“Yep,” he said against my skin as his hand roamed down my ribs to my ass, his fingertips grazing places that made my heart speed up and hips squirm against his very morning wood.
I hummed and slipped my fingers into his hair. “Good. And can I stay the night again?”
“Pen, you can stay as long as you want.” He licked the skin of my neck and kissed the hollow behind my jaw.
“You won’t get sick of me?”
“Not possible,” he whispered in my ear.
“But maybe it is; you don’t know,” I said as he cupped my breast, thumbing my nipple while he kissed my neck as if it tasted like honey.
“You’re probably right,” he muttered between kisses, shifting his hips to angle for me. “I’m sure today will be awful. All that talking.” Kiss. “Hanging out.” Kiss. “Eating.” Kiss. “Fucking,” he said as he pressed his tip against my pussy and flexed, filling me up with a kablam that made fireworks go off behind my eyelids.
I had no words after that. My lips were too busy with his. My body was too busy processing the feeling of him sliding in and out of me, full and then empty, over and over. My mind was too busy with the realization of just how gone I was over him. And my heart was too busy opening up to let him in.
Bodie fucked me slow and sweet in the golden morning sunshine, and I wished for a hundred more mornings just like it. My whole life, I’d been missing this, missing him, and now that I had him, I wouldn’t give him up so easily. Maybe not at all.
A few hours later, we were laughing and holding hands and walking back to his place from mine. I’d packed a bag and gotten nailed good and hard in the shower, and found myself starving, so we ducked into a donut shop to grab a dozen.
He assured me it wasn’t our date.
Just saying — I would have given him an A-plus if it had been.
By the time we got back to his place, I’d convinced him through begging — whining — to let me play his video game demo. He actually had the nerve to ask me if I knew how to use the controller.
Fortunately, he had Mortal Kombat, and I blew his mind up with all the things he thought he’d knew about me but had no idea. Nobody fucked with Sub-Zero. Not even Bodie, video-game-genius-of-the-world-and-my-heart.
And then I played his game.
It was glorious. For twenty too-short minutes, I ran through a temple solving puzzles and watched cut scenes that looked almost like they were out of a movie. While eating donuts and getting cinnamon sugar all over everything. While Bodie watched me like I was a goddess.
He made me feel like a goddess.
It was in the small moments — him smiling down at me as he opened the door to the restaurant that night, holding my hand across the candlelit table while we ate, the look in his eyes when he told me how happy he was.
But Bodie made me feel like more. He made me feel loved and treasured.
And the best part was that I loved and treasured him too.
At the time, in the moment, I couldn’t place the feeling, the whisper of premonition. I just knew that my life would never be the same. I knew I didn’t want to be without him. I knew he’d take care of me, and I knew I’d take care of him too.
That night, we made love in the moonlight. That night, I lost my heart to him forever, and I never wanted it back.
I had his instead.
Epilogue
It was June in New York, which meant it was hot as fuck, but things were looking up. A double scoop of salted caramel was in my hand-slash-mouth, and Bodie was smiling at me from across the table of the ice cream shop where I’d seen him for the first time since high school.
I moaned as I took a long lick of my ice cream, eyes rolling back in my head, hand resting on my very pregnant belly.
“Jesus, fuck, that is so good,” I mumbled around a full mouth, not even swallowing before I went back for more. “I swear, everything tastes better when you’re knocked up.”
He chuckled and licked his ice cream. “Feel better?”
“Mmhmm.” I swallowed. “I’m sorry I’ve been such a raging bitch. It’s just so fucking hot and I’m so fucking fat and I’m so fucking hungry. But this ice cream is so fucking good.”
“You’re not a bitch, Pen.”
I barked out a single laugh. “That’s funny. I nearly slit your throat this morning for leaving your shoes in the living room after I almost tripped and fell and broke my neck. You know I can’t see anything past this.” I gestured to my stomach. “I haven’t seen my feet in a month. Who even knows what my bush looks like.”
He laughed. “Trust me, it looks perfect.”
“Psh, you say that now. Wait until I push your baby out of it. God, my vag is gonna look like a roast beef sandwich.” I frowned, bummed out. And just like that, I thought I might cry.
“Penny,” he said sternly, “your pussy is pink and perfect and mine and nothing will change that.”
I sighed and reached for his hand. “I fucking love you.”
He smiled. “I fucking love you too.”
“Even though I’ve spent a small fortune on fancy stretch-mark lotions?”
“Yep.”
“Even though I’m crazy?”
“Especially because you’re crazy.”
I sighed and licked my ice cream. “You’re the best, babe. You’re like a unicorn.”
“A sex unicorn?”
“I dunno what that is but clearly, the answer is yes.” I pointed to my stomach.
“Hmm, well, the sex unicorn is horny.” He took a lick, eyes twinkling.
I laughed, and the baby shifted and stretched. My hand flew to the spot. “Whoops. I woke Coco up. Sorry, cupcake.” I patted the spot that I thought might be her butt as I took a full-on bite of my ice cream. My teeth stung, and I couldn’t even care — I moaned like I was in a porno.
Bodie laughed and took a bite of his cone.
“This is all your fault, you know,” I said, motioning to my belly. “You and your super sperm. Only I would be in the zero-point-one percent of the population who gets pregnant on birth control.”
“Psh, that was all you. And the stomach flu. You puked your pill up three days in a row.”
I shook my head. “I’m going with super sperm. Lucky for me, you’re a hottie. Our baby is gonna be so pretty.”
“Rock the Casbah” played over the speakers, and I lit up. “It’s our song!”
He smiled at that, and I saw a little secret behind his eyes.
“Know what today is?”
My brow quirked. “June something?”
“Two years ago today, we sat right over there while you ate your ice cream just like that. And that night, we went to—”
“Circus!” I grinned stupidly as my lovesick heart sprouted daisies and butterflies. “I didn’t even know what day that was.”
He shrugged and ate his ice cream like it was no big deal. “I remember stuff like that.”
“I can’t even remember what I had for breakfast this morning,” I said in utter awe. Why a guy like him wanted anything to do with the likes of me, I’d never understand.
“Bagel with strawberry cream cheese, lightly toasted.”
I shook my head, giggling. “You’re my dream guy, you know that?”
“I’m glad you feel that way.”
He pushed a black velvet box across the table at me, taking another lick of his ice cream like it was a totally normal day and he wasn’t giving me one of those boxes with what I was pretty sure was one of tho
se things in it.
“Bodie,” I breathed, my eyes on the box and ice cream dripping onto my hand.
“Penny,” he said softly, a lightness to his voice that betrayed the heaviness underneath.
When I looked up at him, his face was soft and beautiful and perfect and made my insides turn to goop.
“I love you, and I don’t want to be without you. Not ever. I’ve wanted you to be mine every day for the last two years, and I want you to be mine for every day for the rest of my life. I’ve had this ring since we found out you were pregnant, but I figured it would be best to wait until you were so big and dependent on me for foot rubs that you couldn’t say no.”
I laughed through a sob.
His voice softened. “I’ve been waiting for the perfect day, and I found it. Open the box.”
I shoved my ice cream at him and wiped my hands off before picking up the box with trembling fingers. And when I opened it, the most beautifully simple ring lay inside, shining with diamonds and gold and promises of forever.
“Marry me, Pen.”
I breathed for just one second, one savored moment where the man I loved told me he wanted me always, when the life we’d created stretched inside me, when everything was right and perfect and an absolute dream.
And then, I jumped out of my seat and into his arms as best I could weighing a metric ton, and he caught me as best he could with his hands full of ice cream cones.
“Of course I’ll marry you,” I said with my throat tight and heart singing. “I might be crazy, but I’m not stupid.”
He laughed, and it was only then that I realized I was crying, my cheeks soaked and warm and aching from smiling.
And when I kissed him, he tasted like mint chocolate and love and forever.
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Acknowledgments
No book is written without the help of a massive support system, and here are some acknowledgements to some of those who were a part of this story.
Jeff Brillhart — You are a king and a savior, and without your love and support, I just couldn’t even get through it. I don’t think I’d want to. Thank you for always providing inspiration for these books. You’re the reason I believe in love.
Kandi Steiner — How much hand holding could a hand holder hold if a hand holder could hold hands? I think we found the answer. #Freakoutcentral. Hopefully everyone finds Penny as amusing as you and I do. I love you more than tacos, sunshine.
Karla Sorensen — There has never in the history of the world been a better critique partner than you. You know exactly what I need to hear when I need to hear it. You know how to cheer me on and bark at me like a drill sergeant in a way that is always genuine, always just what I need to get motivated. When it’s hard, you’re there, and in a handful of rambling voice messages, we can solve pretty much anything. Maybe we should try our hand at world peace.
BB Easton — Beastie, you’re my hero, my soul sister, my brain twin. I had more fun plotting this book with you than should be legal. Every day you’re here for me to pet my hair and tell me I’m pretty, even when I’m a smelly, bloated sack of garbage. How I ever got so lucky to find you, I’ll never know, but I’ll never stop thanking the universe for you.
To my many, many beta readers — You are all so appreciated. Your feedback shaped this book, shaped these characters, and that influence is as much of a part of the story as my heart is.
Penny Reid and Sara Ney — Here’s to writing characters people hate with our chins up and our hearts behind them. Your pep talks gave me the courage to put my sassy, irreverent character out into the world, and I can’t thank you enough for that.
Marcus Diddle — Thank you for your moniker. I’m sending Janet a T-shirt that says “I got Diddled by Diddle.” She’ll probably use it to clean toilets, and I’m totally cool with that.
To my editors, Ellie McLove and Jovana Shirley — you’ve once again made my story as clean and perfect as humanly possible. Thank you for your hard work and dedication to your work and mine.
Lauren Perry — You are a magical unicorn who finds me magical unicorns and produces magical unicorn photos for my covers. If you ever stop doing cover shoots, I might actually die.
To the bloggers — You make the book world go around. I see you, I appreciate you, I love you, and I thank you for everything you do,
And to you, reader, thank you for your love, your support, and for reading my words. I wouldn’t be where I am without you all, and I love you for picking this up, for following me, just for being.
King Duet
By T.M. Frazier
KING
For Charley & Logan
Prologue
King
Twelve years old
“Come on you fucking fag! You’re such a little fag pussy!”
I’d seen some of the kids in my school bully other kids before, but I’d never felt like I should butt in. If a kid didn’t have the balls to stand up for himself, then they deserved whatever they had coming to them.
But that morning I’d made the decision to leave home for good. Mom’s current boyfriend had used her as a punching bag yet again. But this time, when I’d stepped in front of her, not only did she push me aside, but she defended the fucker.
She said she deserved it.
She even went as far as apologizing.
To him.
I hated her for that. For becoming weak. For letting him lay his hands on her like that. I wanted to wail on John’s face so bad that I sat on the side of the school during recess clenching and unclenching my fists as I replayed that morning over and over again in my mind. I may not have been able to win in a fight against a grown man, but I was convinced I could have at least done some damage.
So when I heard those words shouted from across the playground it was like my anger had made the decision before I had a chance to really think about it. Before I knew it, I’d leapt across the sandbox and was on my way to a group of kids gathered in a circle on the far side of the yard next to the kickball field.
I towered over all the other kids in my grade and could easily see over their heads. In the center of the circle was a brute of a kid named Tyler, a dark-haired boy who always wore band logo t-shirts with the sleeves ripped off. He was holding this skinny kid by the collar of his shirt, punching him in the face over and over again with his closed fist. The littler kid grunted each time Tyler made contact. The boy’s ripped shirt rose up over his pale stomach revealing bruises in varying shades of purple and yellow. His ribs were so visible I could count them. Blood dripped from his nose and fell to the ground. I pushed aside two little girls who were cheering on the beating.
Kids can be fucking cruel.
Adults can be crueler.
I jumped in front of Tyler and cocked back my fist. With one punch to the bully’s pimpled jaw, I knocke
d him flat on his ass. The back of his head landed with a thunk against the pavement. Out cold.
I instantly felt better, although the need to inflict violence was always like a rat gnawing on my every thought and emotion, punching Tyler had temporarily dimmed the feeling from blaring spotlight to burning candle.
The skinny kid was on the ground holding his bloody nose. He moved his hands away from his face and looked up at me with the biggest most ridiculous smile, blood coating teeth that were too big for his mouth. Not what I expected from someone who’d just been beaten. “You didn’t have to save me. I was just letting him get some punches in before I rained down the pain.” His voice cracked on every other word of the lie. Tears ran out the sides of his eyes and down through the blood smeared across his lip. The circle of kids had broken up and gone back to their kickball game.
“I didn’t save you,” I said, stepping over him. I started walking away, but somewhere around the sandbox the kid had caught up with me.
“Of course you didn’t. I could totally have taken him. But shit man, that fucking prick has a stick up his ass,” the kid swore, throwing his hands up into the air as he jogged to try and keep up with my long strides.
“Oh yeah, and why is that?” I asked.
“Cause he wanted me to do his fucking math worksheet, and I’ll tell you something. I’m no one’s fucking bitch. So I told him to fuck off.” His voice was muffled since he was still trying to stop the blood dripping from his nose by pinching his nostrils together.
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